at his own Nike sponsored camp. By now I'm sure most of you know that the dunk itself isn't even the most intriguing part of the story. Everyone gets dunked on. Literally... everyone. Lebron got smashed on by the pride of Western Kentucky, Courtney Lee...twice, in the Eastern Conference Finals this season. It pains me to say that even the Black Mamba gets dunked on . We all know what Kobe did to Dwight Howard a few season ago. As hard as it is to believe, even I have been dunked on. It just happens... it's a hazard of this great game. If you play basketball long enough, you will get posterized in some way, shape, or form.
According to eye witnesses at Lebron's camp, after the Xavier Muskateer dunked on the most famous Cleveland Cavalier, Lebron and a couple of nike reps had a pow-wow and apparently decided to confiscate video evidence of the dunk that one camera man had captured. I guarantee that this whole overblown story that gives millions of blogs like this one material to talk about would not have even existed if Lebron leaves the tape alone.
Whether it was Nike or Lebron himself who made the call to destroy the evidence, it really is irrelevant. If Nike and Nike alone hunted down the camera man for his tape immediately after Jordan Crawford hurt Lebron's feelings, they a) made a serious error in judgement (everyone knows the cover up of any event or happening is more scandalous than the event itself) and b) blew a golden opportunity to make Lebron even more disgustingly popular than he already is (if that's possible).
Hear me out...people adore their favorite athletes, but they worship they ground they walk on if an out-of-this-world talent like Lebron James is humanized and is seemingly just as "posterizable" as everyone else. Nike should have used the opportunity and the video to compose an ad making light of the fact that despite his super-human athletic tools, skill, and physique (6-8 260 with 2.5 % body fat...really?) he is truly a human being, with some type of flaw (albeit a small one), like everyone else. Lebron could have flashed that big, annoying smile and showed everyone how he is able to poke fun at his own misfortune, endearing himself to NBA fans from Cleveland to Hong Kong.
I've even heard rumors the tape was liquidated because Crawford was wearing Adidas gear and the video could have given possible ammunition to Nike's main competitor in a fierce marketing battle. That's a joke. Someone convince me that one dunk by essentially a random guy wearing Adidas over Lebron James will swing the advantage in shoe sales so that this talented but (with the exception of Dwight Howard) hardly exciting brotherhood sell more shoes than Kobe, Lebron, CP3, Amare "STAT" Stoudamire, and Kevin Durant. Word is even Dwayne Wade is finally leaving Converse for the Nike's Jordan Jumpan Brand. You get the idea.
Instead, Nike and Lebron's questionable decision making has people wondering what Lebron's has to hide and why he would be so self-conscious. Even if the dunk wasn't that bad (there's a difference between getting dunked on and really getting dunked on), the simple fact that the tape was confiscated leaves room for speculation...since there's no video evidence to refute this, Lebron could have easily eaten Jordan Crawford's nutsack for lunch that day. Of greater concern is why a gold-medalist, MVP, probable future NBA champion, gazzillion dollar basketball talent like Lebron James would feel the need to cover up something as trivial as a dunk. Is this guy that insecure? We already knew he was a poor-loser and a bad-sport after leaving the gym without shaking any Orlando Magic hands or speaking to the media after the Cavs' playoff exit, but an image-obsessed all-star? It's clear Lebron James' off the court image (which, to be honest, I didn't think that much of to begin with) has whiffed bigtime since the last buzzer of Game 6 in the Orlando series.
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